Printed electronics pilot line starts production

LONDON – PragmatIC Printing
Ltd. (Cambridge, England), a developer of imprinted digital electronic
technology, has commenced
production at its pilot line at the government-backed Centre
for Process Innovation (CPI) in Redcar, Northern England.

PragmatIC has previously
announced projects with Tigerprint, a subsidiary of Hallmark in greetings cards,
and with banknote printer De La Rue in security labels. Imprinted logic projects
are now moving into pilot-scale commercial production, and will be announced
early next year, PragmatIC said.

PragmatIC uses organic
semiconductor materials on a plastic substrate. These materials are formed into
shape using imprint lithography. Typically, for printed electronics geometries
and performance can be far behind that of silicon-based integrated circuits, but
production costs are also considerably lower. PragmatIC claims to be able to
print device and circuit architectures in transparent, flexible semiconductors
at micron and sub-micron scale.

The Redcar pilot line is now producing
more than 10,000 flexible logic circuits per month, and is expected to scale to
over 10 million per annum during 2013, PragmatIC said.

In addition to commercial
production, the pilot line serves as a test-bed for device design, process
optimization and circuit functionality.

For printed electronics to succeed, large manufacturing companies, with both high volume, roll-to-roll film handling capability, and electronic materials knowhow, will have to get seriously engaged. Companies like DuPont, 3M, and the like.

oh and if you follow the stock markets much theres "America's co-called fiscal cliff" potentially looming, so while it might currently cost you 1.60 US dollars to the pound right now to help build some more infrastructure in Redcar, think of it as a wise long term investment as
"the Office for National Statistics kept its estimate for 1 per cent growth in the third quarter unchanged.
This helped the pound rise to nearly 1.24 euros, although sterling slipped to 1.60 US dollars."
Read more: http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/markets/article-2239062/FTSE-CLOSE-Greek-bailout-buoys-Footsie.html#ixzz2DkfskRWZ
"
think of all these future "1.60 US dollars to the pound" returns when you cash it in, a far better return on investment in mainland UK than the Irish EU price you would get later there... :grin:

"Typically, for printed electronics geometries and performance can be far behind that of silicon-based integrated circuits, but production costs are also considerably lower."
while its apparently true about the current "geometries and performance" are lower, it may be not too long before that potentially improves a lot if this University of Glasgow program progress is achieved and integrated in to the UK+EU roll to roll commercial processes http://www.stfc.ac.uk/News+and+Events/5194.aspx
the UK has had its commercial "UK Plastic Electronics Show" for a few years now see http://www.plusplasticelectronics.com/consumerelectronics/plastic-electronics-in-the-spotlight-video-69025.aspx
true its a little DUFF as an advert right now ,but they are actually making commercial stuff, and they know the moneys in the penny's per product markets right now, as they progress through OLED R2R lighting/screen's and later ramp up Nano Dot LED colour displays etc.
and there UK+EU collaborations http://www.plusplasticelectronics.com/energy/eu-project-improving-plastic-electronics-yields-in-r2r-production-55356.aspx
EU project improving plastic electronics yields in R2R production
Sara Ver-Bruggen - 11 May 2012
so interesting progressions going on, theres also
the plasics/Two-photon polymerisation (2PP) 3D nano printing related project
http://source.theengineer.co.uk/materials-and-chemicals/plastic-microstructures-with-nanoscale-features-are-fabricated-at-greater-speed/2009271.article
Austrian researchers have fabricated plastic microstructures with nanoscale features at a greater speed than ever before.
so perhaps the US and Chinese/Japan tech companies should put some cash and help build some more infrastructure in Redcar, Northern England sooner rather than later as this takes off, as they then get to take advantage of the many UK uni's industrial programs doing nano fluidic's,Graphene etc